 Short Stories: January 25, 2006 Issue [#850] |
  Short Stories
This week: Edited by: Red Writing Hood <3  
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I received "Getting Published - Writer's Little Instruction Book" by Paul Ramond Martin (Published by Writer's Digest Books) from my sister for my birthday this year and I'd like to share some of my favorite quotes with you. Look for them in this space:
The first draft is for the writer. Every draft thereafter is for the reader. (page 156)
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TMI (too much information)?
One of the hardest things to overcome when writing short stories and longer fiction is to keep from giving the reader too much information at once. After all, we are the omnipotent being in our writing world. We know all, why shouldn't the reader?
Want to see pictures?
If we are good writers we know our characters inside and out, and like a parent we want to show them off. We want our reader to connect with our character right away, so sometimes we overcompensate by giving a full history and the five year plan for their future to the reader right away.
Now, the hard part: Patience and Trust.
Patience: Your reader wants a trail of breadcrumbs instead of being force-fed a loaf of bread in every paragraph. They want to get to know your characters as they would normally, a little bit at a time.
Trust: You need to trust in yourself and in your writing. You read, you practice your craft – now relax and write. Trust in your reader to follow your trail of bread down the twists and turns of your plot, with your characters for company, of course. 
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EXCERPT: The three of them ate in silence. What could they talk about? A fifteen-year-old girl was an alien being in this environment. Amanda poured coffee and cleared the empty dishes. Still holding her grandmother's coffee cup, she asked abruptly, "Who's Claire?"
Gramma turned pale and choked on a bit of buttered bread. "Claire?" she rasped, taking a sip of the scalding coffee. "What on earth made you ask about Claire?"
EXCERPT: “Good morning you gorgeous creature,” he said through his hugely wide smile, completely belying the years and the struggle he had just had to walk his wiry frame the thirty yards.
“I don’t know what you’ve go to be so cheerful about,” Vera laughed, repositioning a lock of her gentle gray hair, “you’re falling apart.”
EXCERPT: I often wondered what it would be like to have a nickname I liked, one that was given to me out of endearment. I had several nicknames. None of them I liked and none of my friends called me by them. I didn’t have any friends. Instead, I had the shield.
EXCERPT: I sat amongst my fellow third-graders during our quiet reading time on a warm summer afternoon. Mrs. Hoffmeister watched over us closely with her drumstick at her side. Years later I realized the term she actually used was “dunce-stick”, but my young, untrained ears always heard “drumstick”.
EXCERPT: David Benjamin lay in the grass, a few yards from the bustling interstate off Loop 360. Benny let the twinkling diamonds on the black, velvet sky engulf his thoughts.
A coke can flew out the window and nearly hit his head, but that was no tragedy. Instead he instantly pinched it from the ground and hobbled back to his cave
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Gotta question, answer, problem, solution, tip, trick, cheer, jeer, or extra million lying around?
If so, send it through the feedback section at the bottom of this newsletter OR click the little envelope next to my name Red Writing Hood <3 and send it through email.
Submitted By: Mark 
Submitted Comment:
Uhm, daunting... BUT! Clearly time consuming and exhausting to have compiled. I know I browsed the list and will enjoy quite a few reads I hadn't considered previously. Thank you for your efforts, it is greatly appreciated. ~Mark
Submitted By: billwilcox
Submitted Comment:
This is a good one Red--worth its weight in gold. Reading not only makes you a better writer, but also relieves writer's block. And it doesn't really matter which book or books you read, because we are all different and like different material, but reading is essential if you plan on making a career of writing.
Submitted By: dusktildawn
Submitted Comment:
What a very informative Newsletter. You did a lot of research on this and, WOW, what a reading list! I found many books in there that I have read and some I have put on my "to read" list. Many, many thanks! DusktilDawn
Submitted By: IzumiNanaki
Submitted Comment:
Yeah definitely true about the reading more to become a better writer ^_^. Helped me get rid of my writers block :)
Submitted By: C.J.
Submitted Comment:
Great list, may I add a few? I'd say you should check out the following masterpeices:
William Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury (1929)
Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937)
Hemmingway's For Whom the Bell Tolls (1940)
Toni Morrison's Beloved (1987)
cj
Great additions, CJ I watched Beloved with Oprah in the leading role - fantastic, I can only imagine the book being 200 times better!
Submitted By: newykr
Submitted Comment:
The writing references list you provided will help me set and achieve my writing goals for 2006. Thanks!
Submitted By: monikue3
Submitted Comment:
I am sorry to say that there is NO book on how to be a writer. Many of you will disagree, but hear me out. A writer takes an idea, and tells the story HIS/HER way. No one can tell you how to do that. Some people can tell a story and some can't. No book in the world will ever change that. Some books, or rather people writing how-to books, do so for the money. Let's face it, that's where the bottom line is positioned. Some of us just want to tell a story. Dictionaries and the Thesaurus are helpful for alternative wording, but the whole concept comes from the writer's brain. You cannot write a book on that.
You make a good point and I wouldn't advise anyone to surround themselves with how-to writing books and tell them to expect to write the next best seller but a very dear friend of mine said in a group forum (about another topic) just this week, "writing - those skills CAN be learned"
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